Better Buttermilk Pancakes With One Genius Ingredient Swap

Every week in Genius Recipes—often with your help!—Food52 Creative Director and lifelong Genius-hunter Kristen Miglore is unearthing recipes that will change the way you cook.

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These pancakes will taste richer, fuller, and more buttermilk-y in any side-by-side taste test—all thanks to one little ingredient switcheroo. And that might not even be my favorite part. My favorite part is how wrong I was.

When I saw the name “Buttermilk Mochi Pancakes” (1) in Cynthia Chen McTernan’s stunning new cookbook A Common Table, my brain jumped straight to mochi, and to chew (2): the pastel cushioning on the ice cream balls at my favorite Japanese restaurant, the sweet gummy bits on top of my frozen yogurt. And, while I love that classic mochi chew, I wasn’t sure how it would mesh with my bubbly-tender-fluffy buttermilk pancake ideal (3).

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It turns out, it doesn’t. As Cynthia points out in the recipe’s headnote, even though her recipe swaps out half of the all-purpose flour for sweet rice flour, the point (and the effect) is not to mochi-fy the texture. “Interestingly, a bit of sweet rice flour mixed with all-purpose flour results in pancakes that aren’t dense and chewy like pure mochi is,” she writes. “Instead, they’re just the slightest bit softer and more tender, with a faint milkiness I like.”

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I’ve done a side-by-side taste test here: The rice flour version does read subtly but definitively better (and disappears faster). By comparison, straight all-purpose just tastes a bit flat, so switching to rice flour is a little like leaving black and white Kansas and landing in Oz. Like listening to Queen perform at Live Aid, then remembering to take out your earplugs. Like learning how to salt your food to taste for the first time.

Photo by Ty Mecham

I was delighted to learn how wrong my assumptions had been, and what sweet rice flour could sneak in and do for my pancakes (and who knows what else!). And because the effect is working in the background and not entirely texture-redefining, it’s also quite flexible. When I haven’t been able to find sweet rice flour, I’ve grabbed other types of rice flour and seen very similar improvements.

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Top Comment:

“I used buttermilk. Poured hot ghee and maple syrup over top of pancakes.. what can I say? Heaven! Thanks, Kristen. You always feature great chefs and recipes. Keep it up!”

This felt like discovering a secret superpower. My mom’s pancakes are the best, I could hear my daughter say, about five years from now. Except I won’t keep it a secret—I’ll tell her exactly where it comes from.

tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled, plus more for the pan and for serving

Maple syrup, for serving

1/2

cup (63g) all-purpose flour

1/2

cup (70g) sweet rice flour, like Mochiko Blue Star

1

tablespoon sugar

1

teaspoon baking powder

1/2

teaspoon baking soda

1/4

teaspoon salt

1

large egg, separated

1/2

cup Greek yogurt

1/2

cup milk of your choice

2

tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled, plus more for the pan and for serving

Maple syrup, for serving

(1) You might notice that the ingredient list doesn’t even actually have buttermilk in it. That’s because Cynthia is working a brilliant hack—equal parts yogurt and milk behave just like buttermilk, for all those times when you don’t have a quart sitting in the fridge. (Of course you could just use buttermilk, if you’re better at planning ahead.)

(2) As Cynthia herself described mochi on Food52 in 2015: “A gentler incarnation of a marshmallow, it is subtly sweet and powdery pastel, with a hint of coconut and a pillowy-soft chew.“

The Genius Desserts cookbook is here! With more than 100 of the most beloved and talked-about desserts of our time (and the hidden gems soon to join their ranks) this book will make you a local legend, and a smarter baker to boot.

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I'm an ex-economist, ex-Californian who moved to New York to work in food media in 2007. Dodgy career choices aside, I can't help but apply the rational tendencies of my former life to things like: recipe tweaking, digging up obscure facts about pizza, and deciding how many pastries to put in my purse for "later."

Just buy this stuff https://www.walmart.com/ip/Saco-Cultured-Buttermilk-Blend-12-oz/10319960?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=0&wl13=4623&adid=22222222227000000000&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=t&wl3=42423897272&wl4=pla-51320962143&wl5=9008564&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=8175035&wl11=local&wl12=10319960&wl13=4623&veh=sem&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIhOvL28nV4AIVBl6GCh3hzQ0yEAQYASABEgJND_D_BwE

Made these this am and ate til I was sick! These pancakes were awesome! Fluffy and light with great flavor. I used buttermilk. Poured hot ghee and maple syrup over top of pancakes.. what can I say? Heaven! Thanks, Kristen. You always feature great chefs and recipes. Keep it up!

I just made these. You can definitely taste the sweet rice flavor if you are familiar with eating mochis. Separating the eggs and adding the egg whites without whipping them is a game changer. We ate them with some sliced strawberries sprinkled with sugar, maple syrup and butter. Yes!!!

“Yogurt may be substituted for buttermilk, volume for volume, meaning 1 cup of yogurt may be substituted for 1 cup of buttermilk. In the reverse, you can usually substitute buttermilk for yogurt or sour milk on a one-to-one basis. Another option is "clabbered milk," a blend of milk and lemon juice or vinegar.“

Thanks, Ocracoke! Heather, in this recipe, Cynthia says to sub the milk and yogurt for 1 cup buttermilk, if you prefer that. But I bet straight yogurt would work fine here, too, and might make them even fluffier (now I need to find out!).

Yes, in step 3 of the recipe there are a couple notes about substitutions, and other kinds of rice flour is one of them! https://food52.com/recipes/80522-cynthia-chen-mcternan-s-buttermilk-mochi-pancakes

There's no buttermilk at all here. Don't call it buttermilk pancakes and then list "milk of your choice" as the ingredient. Why not just list "flour of your choice" too. Hard pass.I'll continue to use the Alton Brown recipe which works, is specific, and contains (surprise) buttermilk.

Ah, look at the original recipe, it does have buttermilk, buttermilk milk is a pain to buy, you never use it up before having to throw it away. The cup of Greek yogurt provides the acid for the baking soda to react, it also helps baking powder somewhat although heat is the main catalyst here. It’s a common practice for people not to use buttermilk and substitute a faux buttermilk with a little vinegar mixture, or yogurt. Both provide the chemical reaction and the sour taste. https://www.epicurious.com/ingredients/substitute-buttermilk-baking-article

It’s very common for a buttermilk recipe to not have buttermilk just because of the inconvenience.

I’m not sure what the rant is all about?

As I say I would substitute back in the buttermilk as we buy this stuff in dry form, keeps forever.

I would advise always to mix the dry separate, them the wet, then combine and leave the dough lumpy, don’t hesitate to then use the dough as soon as possible. You will be amazed at the thickness achieved.

As soon as the acid and the baking soda hit each other they start to produce CO2 gas, if you beat the dough smooth, you just beat out the gas. Don’t worry about the lumps, trust me, they will bake right out.

Michele, you don't need mochi for this recipe, but the sweet rice flour it refers to can be found at Asian markets and plenty of nicer grocery stores these days, too (and online). If you can't find it, the recipe lists substitutes, including other types of rice flour or, in a pinch, all-purpose flour.

I've been using part oat flour in quick bread, muffin, and coffee cake recipes and enjoy the texture and taste benefits. An amazing little flavor trick for pancakes is to add a T or 2 of non-diastatic malt powder (made from roasted barley). Nice touch in cornbread, too. End flavor result is rather like you've added caramel.

Sure thing—if you need to seriously cut the dairy, you could try the vegan buttermilk substitute of plant-based milk + acid (e.g. a tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in a measuring cup, then fill up to the 1 cup line with the milk & let sit for 5-10 minutes to get 1 cup vegan buttermilk sub). You might lose out on some richness, but could compensate with a little more melted butter (or coconut oil).